<p>Thanks to saintofme for posting this on the parent’s thread</p>
<p>*As higher education has become more competitive, schools find themselves in a race to keep up, push ahead, grow, or fall behind. Recently, representatives of five Philadelphia-area colleges and universities, along with David Thornburgh of the Pennsylvania Economy League, traveled to Asia to sell the region as an educational destination.</p>
<p>Globalization in higher education is a natural evolution of the competitive process.</p>
<p>Though 2003-04 saw the first decline in foreign enrollment in 30 years - a dip tied mainly to post-9/11 visa strictures - determination is fierce among colleges and universities racing to attract more international students.</p>
<p>A half-century ago, the Fulbright scholarships became an instrument of U.S. foreign policy, drawing the best and brightest graduate students from overseas and sending them home to become leaders in their own countries, imbued with the heady spirit of American-style democracy.</p>
<p>In recent years, the emphasis has shifted to undergraduates, so that now, with nearly 600,000 foreign students in the United States, there is virtually an even split between undergraduate and graduate students. Private colleges tend to have more foreign-born undergrads, while public universities enroll more grad students.</p>
<p>Selective colleges know that foreigners are immoderately influenced by rankings that appear in U.S. News & World Report and the Princeton Review.</p>
<p>*</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/13155953.htm[/url]”>http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/13155953.htm</a></p>